Labour has slammed “rip-off railways” and promised Britain could “take back control” of fares by re-nationalising the network.

Shadow Transport Secretary Andy McDonald accused the Government of being more interested in "defending train companies than defending passengers" as he insisted state ownership of the railways can be successful.

He said "by nationalising railways, profits could help keep train fares low".

Speaking at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool, Mr McDonald told delegates: "What we have now is a Government clinging to a failed model for purely ideological reasons, and passengers and taxpayers are being made to pay an ever increasing price."

In fact with the lessons that have been learned from the last period of nationalisation of the railways I see no reason why under state control, ( like many of the European railways are run ), there is no reason that Britain's re-nationalised rail services should not be run well, if the finance is there, the trains run on time, they are modern, clean and fast and the people who pay for their tickets do not have to pay massive percentages to the profit driven private companies that do it so badly at the moment.

We can learn from our mistakes and learn from the French and German railways just how to do it.

While I agree that the whole rail network in Britain should be re-nationalised, we have to realise that to be able to do that would mean heavy compensation being paid to the private companies that run these services at the moment.

Ghandi; nearly all the Continental Railways are Nationalised, they are modern, clean, uncrowded, yet run at a profit which maintains the infastructure, and best of all, prices are far cheaper than here.

I would suggest that you educate yourself before shooting from the lip!